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Workers are punished for management's folly

It is reported that Australia Post will sack 900 workers, with most jobs to go from Melbourne and Sydney. Australia Post blames, among other things, its failing letters business. Really, Australia Post? Do you expect us to believe this spin?

The demise of this service is your fault - for example, the exorbitant price of 70¢ for an ordinary letter, the ridiculous penalties for letters that are heavier by even a couple of grams or are a couple of millimetres too long or wide, and the extravagant charges for delivering a letter that does not have a stamp.

Senior management should pay the price for their stupidity, not the ordinary workers - workers whom management have to thank for their obscene salaries.

Robert McCormick, Bridgewater

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The booming parcels business

I am puzzled that Australia Post needs to shed jobs.

After lodging a complaint with it, I received a call from its Melbourne headquarters. The official explained that it had so many parcels, it could not manage to send one with the wrong postcode to the correct suburb. Instead, it returned the parcel by sea to Britain, where months can elapse before it is received.

Such a dreadful service suggests that Australia Post needs more, not fewer workers. I also note that the focus is on the decline in letter mail, while the excuse to me for not delivering a parcel was that Australia Post had more parcels than it could handle.

Jean Youatt, Mount Waverley

Trim obscene executive salaries

We have a huge deficit and Australians have been asked by the government to carry the load and endure increased taxes and cuts to welfare, health and education. Yet Australia Post is in financial crisis - and its chief executive Ahmed Fahour was paid an obscene $4.8 million last year.

Mr Fahour justifies staff and postal delivery cuts to the failing letter business, but he does not mention the dramatic increase in parcel deliveries due to online shopping.

At times, our small, local post office has so much trouble accommodating the parcels that are waiting to be picked up that they spill out onto the shop floor and the staff cannot move.

I do not understand why someone who is as smart and business savvy as Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull is not questioning how much Fahour is earning, especially when his counterparts in the United States and England earn less and run bigger services.

Vita Mezzatesta, Pascoe Vale

A tragic sign of the times

Our postal services are the latest victim of corporatisation and privatisation.

Telstra takes everything it can from a largely deregulated communications sector. Our utilities squeeze all of us, especially the poor, in pursuit of increased profits. Public transport and prisons have become profit-making enterprises. Yet we have a market-fixated government, hell bent on selling off the remaining few essential services that are still in public hands.

The once taxpayer-funded health, welfare and education sectors are now demanding that the user pays. Asylum seekers are sent offshore and cared for by business entrepreneurs.

Who will defend the national interest? Which party will champion an economy that serves society instead of the other way around? How long will it be before the electorate says enough is enough?

Hans Paas, Castlemaine

The forgotten workers

Given that women do most of the unpaid work and are more likely to volunteer, I was surprised to read they received less than a third of all Order of Australia honours (The Age, 9/6).

Flicking to this year's list, I was more surprised to find part of the explanation. Along with the "General Division", there is a "Military Division", "Police Medal", "Fire Services Medal", "Ambulance Service Medal", "Emergency Services Medal", and another nine awards for the army/navy - all roles that continue to be mainly filled by men, particularly in the upper ranks.

Where is the "Nurses Medal'', ''Social Workers Medal'' and ''Childcare Workers Medal''? Financial remuneration and leave entitlements for these professions are much less than for police officers, firefighters etc. Can we not at least see a few token awards? When will Australia honour work traditionally done by the other 50 per cent?

Catherine Carter, Richmond

Meet our new leaders

It was disturbing and embarrassing to watch incoming senators Ricky Muir and Zhenya Wang being interviewed by Mike Willesee (Sunday Night, 8/6).

While one can have sympathy for inexperience, what is worrying is their seemingly inadequate ability to articulate an understanding of the responsibility they will hold, and the ability to answer questions coherently.

One can respect a difference of opinion when it is articulated clearly and with passion. I fear for the continued assault on our democratic principles.

Judith Morrison, Mount Waverley

And change the system

No law-abiding Australian citizen should be barred from nominating for election to the Senate, but if the excruciatingly embarrassing interview with Senator-elect Muir proves anything, it is that the method of voting must be overhauled.

As we vote for six senators from each state at each half-Senate election, above-the-line voting should be abolished, with voters instructed to choose their six most favoured candidates numbered from one to six. This would be the most democratic way of voting for the upper house as it would allow voters to make their own choices or to vote according to party lines.

Don Lancaster, Prahran

Learning to share

Could The Age reaffirm that the new section of ''bike trail' from Carrum to Warburton is, indeed, a ''bike trail'' (The Age, 9/6).

As noted in the article, it is a ''shared path'' for pedestrians and cyclists. Pedestrians have right of way. The fact that these paths are called ''bike paths'' incites much angst, with cyclists assuming they have the right (and undoubtedly the might) to scatter all in their way.

It is all very well for the RACV to rejoice in getting cyclists out of the way of their cars, but pedestrians in Victoria get little or no support to undertake what can be life-saving exercise each day. Cyclists should be issued with VicRoads' laws regarding shared paths. It is obvious these are neither known nor policed.

Doris LeRoy, Altona

Snoozing on the job

Tony Abbott has again managed to embarrass Australians during an overseas trip - this time by dozing during a D-Day observation ceremony. His concentration span must be very short.

George Norrish, Essendon

Such needless killing

A man is killed by a crocodile, so two crocodiles are shot and killed (The Age, 9/6). While I sympathise with the family of anyone whose life has been lost in this way, I cannot see how killing the ''guilty'' crocodile helps anyone.

Unlike humans, crocodiles (or sharks or lions) cannot get into a car, plane or boat and choose to go somewhere else. They live in the rivers, seas or jungles. They do not have the intellect or sensibilities of humans, yet we kill them for acting on their instinct.

Valerie Seal, North Fitzroy

Time for Tassie team

On Saturday, at Homebush Stadium, the match between Greater Western Sydney and the usually highly popular Essendon Bombers drew a crowd of a mere 8500. In Launceston, the match between the Hawks and the West Coast Eagles drew a near capacity crowd of 15,500.

Many talented Tasmanians are playing in the AFL, many at elite level: Mitch Robinson, Tom Bellchambers, Jeremy Howe, to name but a very few. How many young players come from the Greater Western Sydney area, with its huge population base? It is time for a Tassie team.

Belinda Kendall-White, Bellerive, Tas

Barbaric punishment

Congratulations to Martin Flanagan on his challenge to the ACT Young Liberals on the road testing of caning (Forum, 7/6).

As a student at a Marist Brothers' day school in the 1950s, I experienced the strap and the cane, both wielded with enthusiasm and applied to outstretched hands. It was more painful on cold and frosty mornings. I was convinced by this experience that corporal punishment had no place in effective education and, in a teaching career spanning nearly 40 years, never felt any desire to see it brought back.

I look forward with interest to the response of those who introduced this ignorant motion.

Brian Brasier, Donald

In praise of our schools

I was enraged when I read Christopher Bantick's article (Comment, 9/6). I teach at a government high school that proudly has ''The Best Always'' as its motto. We do not refer to our core values as ''old school'' because we believe that ''discipline, respect for authority (we call it respect for others and self), scholarship, goodness and common decency'' are values that all schools strive to inculcate.

Similarly, we encourage our students to strive for academic excellence, not just ''academic achievement for its own sake'' but for the sake of the betterment of all.

I suspect that educators across all schools, public and private, would be insulted by the flawed arguments and insinuations made in this narrow view of what it is to be a successful school. Perhaps Bantick needs to visit other schools to see the work being done to give students the opportunity to be well-rounded global citizens.

Patsy McHugh, Frankston South

Values and traditions

Unfortunately Christopher Bantick confuses ''values'' with traditions and practices. Ironically, the value of the ''betterment of others'' is often a direct challenge to traditions and practices that deliberately or incidentally exclude some students. This is a challenge for all schools, particularly faith-based ones.

Linda Brownstein, Swan Hill

An inequitable system

I agree, Ian Anderson (Letters 7/6): the answer to underquoting on property is to do away with real estate agents' estimates. Agents act for the vendor, not the buyer. Indeed, communicating any form of pricing information to a buyer represents a conflict of interest, unless it is done solely for the vendor's benefit.

If buyers require advice on pricing, bidding and negotiation, they need to employ their own agents/advocates. This might be regarded as yet another service industry adding to the cost of buying property. However, the more common circumstance, in which only one party has the benefit of professional advice, disadvantages the other.

Mark Summerfield, Northcote

Reality of real estate

It seems that few people understand what the reserve price is. It is the vendor's confidential figure that he will not, or cannot, sell below. Nobody should be obliged to declare their bedrock price.

Vendors want to get the best price for themselves and the best way for many is to offer the property for sale in a competitive environment where the public determines what they are prepared to pay. In any competitive environment, there are winners and losers. Buyers forget they will probably be vendors one day. They will then need to decide whether they will be prepared to declare their reserve. I think not.

Gerald Marks, South Yarra

Waiting, still waiting

Victorian Public Transport Minister Terry Mulder says that trains skipping stations is justifiable (Saturday Age, 7/6). On a recent journey from South Yarra to Healesville, the Lilydale train was running six minutes late when it arrived at Ringwood where it sat for a further four minutes. It was then terminated at Mooroolbark, one station short of its destination, Lilydale. With half an hour before the next train, I missed my connecting bus to Healesville. My journey travel time was 80 minutes, and 95 minutes of waiting time. If this is OK with Mr Mulder, it indicates the low priority his government puts on public transport.

Andrew Blair, Healesville

AND ANOTHER THING...

National

Ricky Muir, an ''ordinary Australian''. Very ordinary, and an apt representative for the ''ordinary Australian voter''.